Who's pickin' the banjo here?

"Then he reached out and took the knife to slaughter his son." --Gen. 22:10

Old Testament
Book 1: Genesis
Chapter 21: Sarah is again vicious to Hagar
Chapter 22: God tells Abraham to kill Isaac
Chapter 23: Abraham buys Sarah a grave
Chapter 24: Abraham buys Isaac a wife

This story of God telling Abraham to kill Isaac can be read in many ways. First it reveals, I think, for the first time how truly demented and vicious God is. This is abuse that would be shocking if we heard about it on the evening news. We've all had the conversation a dozen times. First the exclamation of shock, then the exchanges of "how could anyone do that?" But it's in the bible, so no one is allowed to question the obvious nastiness of this story.

Then there is Abraham. If we read the story in the light most favorable to him, the argument is that he knew all along that God would not make him go through with it (and he does tell Isaac that God will provide a sacrifice for them on the mountain). But Abraham ties down his son, throws him on top of the pile of wood, and approaches him with knife drawn before God intervenes. If you've ever heard a child scream in terror when they think, for instance, their mom is lost in the supermarket, Isaac's screams must have made those screams sound like whimpers. The bible doesn't mention this, nor do any followers of this book. The emotional harm that Abraham does to Isaac on this day is unfathomable.

Should Abraham have done this? Of course not. The most important thing about this story is that this is the moment when it is made clear that it doesn't matter whether God exists or not. It doesn't matter whether you believe, whether you have faith, whether he sent his only begotten son to die on the cross for your sins. Who cares? God in this story is one of the most vicious, evil characters in all of literature. Any moral person who would read this story could have only one possible reaction: I don't care whether God exists or not. I only hope he doesn't, because I want nothing to do with him. I would rather spend eternity in hell than spend one day pretending to love someone who would do this to a 13-year-old boy.

That is exactly what Abraham should have said and done. He should have refused to do this to his son, not because he did not have faith in God, but because it was wrong. It is unforgivable.

Do you think God needed to do this, to make sure Abraham was faithful before he bestowed on him the promise of making his descendants as countless as the stars in the sky? (Gen. 22:17) Think about this story, and everything we've read so far seriously. First of all, God had already promised Abraham exactly that. If he has now placed a condition on that promise, that modification is unenforceable. It means by definition that God has already, before we've even begun, broken his promise to the "chosen people." This is another reason to believe nothing he says. Even if you are not as repulsed by God's behavior as a moral person would be, God clearly is a liar and cannot be trusted. So again, how can you spend your life having faith that this time he is telling the truth? There is only one way to treat such an untrustworthy person: cut them out of your life.

But there's another thing here. Let's take the story at face value: God had no intention of killing Isaac, Abraham knew he had no intention, and so both were just pretending. Then what is the point of the whole exercise? If Abraham really knew that God would not let him do it, then this was no test at all. God discovered nothing. But also, if God is omniscient, he would already know whether Abraham is devoted to him or not--what is the point of testing him? There can be no possible explanation except God's sadism. Unless God isn't omniscient, which is the feeling we have had at several points already in the bible so far.

At any rate, the stories up to this point have been fun, maybe a little silly, some a little scandalous. But all forgivable, or at least dismissable. This story goes far beyond that. All these questions Christians and atheists fight over--proof of God, faith, and so on, mean nothing after this point because no moral person, even in the face of everlasting damnation, would respect or worship God after this episode.

--bibletoenail

PS. I forgot to mention, there is one more important element to this story, and that is how it foreshadows God sacrificing his own son for our benefit. First of all, after what God does here he should sacrifice his own son as retribution, which makes it no kind of favor to us at all, but what he owes us for what he did to Isaac. Secondly, it's interesting, I think, how Christian's focus on Jesus' suffering, and never mention what Isaac went through. Oh, third, of course, and I'm sure we'll have many more opportunities to talk about this, since Jesus was God, God wasn't sacrificing his son at all, but himself. As God, Jesus chose to be on the cross. That's more chance than Isaac was given. But most importantly, if this story foreshadows what happens to Jesus, let's look at that a moment. In this analogy, Abraham == God, Isaac == Jesus. That part is obvious. Abraham did it for God, God in the Jesus incident did it for us, so that means in the latter story God == humans. There are many enormous problems with this analogy. First of all, in the first story God commanded Abraham to kill his son. We humans never ever asked anything like that of God. In fact, from what we have read so far in Genesis, we humans simply want to live our own lives without interference from God, and it is his constant meddling that causes all the trouble. I find it very hard to believe that if we had actually talked about it, that humans ever would ask God to sacrifice his son for us. We humans, for all our faults, simply are not that vicious or evil.

Of course in the end God in the first story told Abraham to stop, and we humans in the second story did not tell God to stop. Or did we? Well, Pontius Pilate certainly did! Pilate begged Jesus to stop this madness, and he insisted on doing it nonetheless. No one killed Jesus, he chose to die. He could have stopped it at any time and he did not.

This Jesus story holds no moral weight whatsoever. God put himself and his son in this situation, and Jesus chose to die, no one forced him. Humans, if we'd been given the chance, would not have asked God to do what he did. And an unsolicited favor is no favor. I can't go over to your house at midnight to scoop your drive, then ask you for $20 in the morning. I didn't ask you to do it, and if you'd asked me I'd have told you no.

One of the major themes of this blog so far is that it is irrelevant whether God really exists or not, because no rational, and certainly no moral person would have anything to do with him whether he did or not. The question of whether God exists is fundamentally unimportant. We should not be afraid to have God taught in school, we should teach God in school--that would end the problems we have with the religious right quicker than anything.


Textual notes:
- Gen. 21:17 --There's no doubt that God is not alone up in heaven (Oh, and here is a mention of heaven as well--it might be the first)--he has a lot of messengers. Here, and in the previous story about Lot. So maybe when he created the world he was telling his messengers what to do. Also, one of these messengers must be the one with the hot wife that sunbathes in that skimpy bikini.

- Gen. 21:19 --God actually performs quite a miracle here, one of the biggest, I would say, to date (discounting all the destruction that he is so fond of). He apparently makes a well appear before Hagar.

- Gen. 21:30 --Here's a real case of consideration for a promise or bargain. Abraham complains to Abimelech that his men had taken one of Abraham's wells. Abimelech says he knew nothing about it. Abraham takes seven ewes from a flock and gives them to Abimelech, that he "may have [Abimelech's] acknowledgement that the well was dug by Abraham."

- Gen. 22:6 --I love that Abraham made Isaac carry the wood for his own sacrifice. That's hardcore.

- Gen. 22:21 --I love Nahor and Milcah's sons, Uz and Buz.

- Gen. 22:22 --Nahor's other children included Bethuel.

- Gen. 22:23 --And Bethuel becomes the father of Rebekah. It's important to keep straight exactly the familial relationship between Isaac and Rebekah. Because guess who marries Isaac. So Rebekah's grandfather is Nahor. Nahor is Abraham's brother. So Abraham is Rebekah's great-uncle. So Isaac and Bethuel are first cousins. So Isaac and Rebekah are first cousin's once removed. Another generation of incest in the chosen people's family tree!

- Gen. 22:24 --Oh, and Nahor had a concubine as well, who bore Nahor four children also. Remember that Abraham has two brothers (Gen. 11:26), Nahor and Haran. Haran is the father of Lot (Gen. 11:27). So Abraham and Nahor both had children by their slave girls, Lot has children with both of his daughters, and Isaac marries his first cousin. All this in the space of two generations. Click here to see a movie about Abraham's family. Abraham is pumping the Gas, Isaac is the one on the porch.

- Gen. ch. 23 --This is an interesting little story about Sarah's grave sight. Abraham wants to buy a plot of land from the Hittites, but the Hittites want to give it to him for free. They argue for quite some time, Abraham wanting to pay, the Hittites refusing to accept. It's the second time we've seen this setup--the first was Gen. 14:21-23. The king of Sodom tries to give Abram some goods, but Abram refuses, saying "I have sworn to the Lord . . . that I would not take so much as a thread or a sandal strap from anything that is yours, lest you should say, 'I made Abram rich." It's an interesting aspect of these stories, there's a lot of emphasis on bargaining, and on contract, and on paying for something to keep from being indebted to the other person. It's interesting to consider that in light of what God does to us by sacrificing Jesus, isn't it? That is exactly the situation Abraham was always trying to avoid--letting someone give you a gift, then claiming you are indebted to them. Well, we, you reading this and I, certainly never had a chance to refuse God's gift, and we can certainly not be obligated because of it.

- Gen. 23:4 n. 2 --This note explains Abraham's insistence on paying for the land in this way. As a "resident alien" in the Hittite land, he was not allowed to own land. By purchasing the land rather than receiving it as a gift, he established a right of ownership to this parcel of land, though small, in the country that God had promised Abraham they would one day inherit as their own. The note also points out the technical legal terms used in this passage.

- Gen. 24:2 -- "Put your hand under my thigh." Another great moment in the bible. My Oxford Study Edition says that "thigh" was a euphemism for his balls!

- Gen. 24:10-20 --This is a very sweet story of how Abraham finds Isaac's first cousin Rebekah for Isaac to marry.

- Gen. 24:35 --By the way, I haven't mentioned this before, but what's up with all the slaves? Not very Christian nor moral.

- Gen. 24:10-50 --Brilliant writing. First we watched the servant pray for it to happen, then we watched it word-for-word happen, now we are listening to him recount word-for-word how it happened. This is the longest chapter so far, and it consists of the same story three times.

- Gen. 24:67 --Another sexy story. Rebekah the virgin agrees to go meet Isaac. When they meet, without saying a word he takes her into his tent and does her right then! She'd only been gone from her family about a day. But, the bible says, he was still grieving from the death of his mother, and having sex with this anonymous virgin comforted him.

Quotables:
"The girl was very beautiful, a virgin, untouched by man." --Gen. 24:16
"Here is Rebekah, ready for you." --Gen. 24:51